Right Side Dream

I sleep on my sides. I use a C-Path machine so the mask doesn't let me sleep on my stomach--which I used to do sometimes--and I've never slept on my back, probably because my childhood asthma made sleeping on my back very congesting.

So, I sleep on my sides--mostly on the left side but sometimes on the right. I read in bed most nights and always on my right side, so when I turn to my left to turn off the light, I usually just stay there.

One thing I've noticed over the years is that I seldom dream on  my right side. Dreams come from left side sleeping. Which makes the dream I had in the middle of the night on my right side unusual.

And the dream itself was unusual.

After years of Jungian dream analysis, I tend to remember dreams and ponder them. Last nights deserves it.

I was in a large room--as large as a small church with several other people, all of whom I knew. Oh, they weren't people I know in waking life but I knew them all in the dream.

There were three people behind a bar that stretched almost all the way against the left wall. There were no bottles behind it so it wasn't a bar in that sense. In fact the stools were those kind that turn that the base is screwed into the floor and they were white and cushioned like diner stools. The bar looked like the bar you see in old-fashioned diners.

Three women were behind the bar talking animatedly with two men, one on a stool, the other standing beside a stool. In the dream I knew them all and was eves-dropping on them. (Which I do in real life! I tend to hear most of the conversations around me.)

The other part of the room had several desks like in an office. I was at one of them. There were two men and one woman at desks and a few empty desks. One desk--not mine--had a chair in front of it and people would come in and talk to the man there for a while. It was like he was advising them about something.

What I was doing was sorting little hard paper animals--like pieces of a puzzle--and attaching small strips of a narrow orange tape on them and then writing something I was thankful for on each and dropping them in a glass. I believed the other people at the desks were doing the same thing, but I wasn't sure if it were a competition between us to write the most things we were thankful for or not.

I remember some of the things I was writing on the tape on the animals--'nature', 'Bern', 'grandchildren's names', 'birds', 'love' and other things.

Just as I was worried I would run out of animals and tape before I ran out of things I was thankful for, one of the men at the bar said something about 'a pint and some chips' and everyone in the room--including me--burst into a boisterous chant about pints and chips that sounded like a sea chanty.  I didn't know the words but sang along with no problem.

In the midst of us singing and laughing, a tall, young man with lots of curly hair, dressed like a Hippie from the 60's--wild shirt and bell bottom pants and sandals. He sat down in front of the man and was totally confused and I tried to tell him why we were chanting but was laughing too much to make sense (besides, I didn't know why!).

Just then someone came and gave me more cardboard animals and more orange tape.

Then I woke up.

Already I know my 'Dream Maker' was telling me I had lots of things to be thankful for and ought to say more about them. Sunday I'm going to tell the people of St. James that when we get to the part of the Prayers of the People where we give God thanks, I want it to last 5 minutes and we should talk over each other and just say out loud every thing we're thankful for....

I'll ponder the rest of the dream some more, teasing out other messages from my unconscious mind and heart and let you know if anything really interesting shows up.

In the meantime--spend more time pondering and sharing what you're thankful for.

That might be a very good and transforming thing to do...and keep doing....